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Isozymes of myosin have been localized with respect to individual fibers in differentiating skeletal muscles of the rat and chicken using immunocytochemistry. The myosin light chain pattern has been analyzed in the same muscles by two-dimensional PAGE. In the muscles of both species, the response to antibodies against fast and slow adult myosin is consistent with the speed of contraction of the muscle. During early development, when speed of contraction is slow in future fast and slow muscles, all the fibers react strongly with anti-slow as well as with anti-fast myosin. As adult contractile properties are acquired, the fibers react with antibodies specific for either fast or slow myosin, but few fibers react with both antibodies. The myosin light chain pattern slow shows a change with development: the initial light chains (LC) are principally of the fast type, LC1(f), and LC2(f), independent of whether the embryonic muscle is destined to become a fast or a slow muscle in the adult. The LC3(f), light chain does not appear in significant amounts until after birth, in agreement with earlier reports. The predominance of fast light chains during early stages of development is especially evident in the rat soleus and chicken ALD, both slow muscles, in which LC1(f), is gradually replaced by the slow light chain, LC1(s), as development proceeds. Other features of the light chain pattern include an “embryonic” light chain in fetal and neonatal muscles of the rat, as originally demonstrated by R.G. Whalen, G.S. Butler- Browne, and F. Gros. (1978. J. Mol. Biol. 126:415-431.); and the presence of approximately 10 percent slow light chains in embryonic pectoralis, a fast white muscle in the adult chicken. The response of differentiating muscle fibers to anti-slow myosin antibody cannot, however, be ascribed solely to the presence of slow light chains, since antibody specific for the slow heavy chain continues to react with all the fibers. We conclude that during early development, the myosin consists of a population of molecules in which the heavy chain can be associated with a fast, slow, or embryonic light chain. Biochemical analysis has shown that this embryonic heavy chain (or chains) is distinct from adult fast or slow myosin (R.G. Whalen, K. Schwartz, P. Bouveret, S.M. Sell, and F. Gros. 1979. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 76:5197-5201. J.I. Rushbrook, and A. Stracher. 1979. Proc Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 76:4331-4334. P.A. Benfield, S. Lowey, and D.D. LeBlanc. 1981. Biophys. J. 33(2, Pt. 2):243a[Abstr.]). Embryonic myosin, therefore, constitutes a unique class of molecules, whose synthesis ceases before the muscle differentiates into an adult pattern of fiber types.
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